Page 73 of Brutal Revenge

Azra was too drunk for me to touch, but instead of walking away, I gave Dante every excuse to lynch me. It’s not my fault. That woman…Jesus.Her mouth tastes like heaven, and I’d pay a million dollars for the privilege of eating her pussy again, but fucking an intoxicated woman is the lowest of the low, and I’m still a boy dying to see his mother one last time.

I should have walked the instant I backed away from her kiss. Our exchange should have ended there, but no, I had to stay and watch Azra perform a sex act on herself like a perv who’s never had his dick sucked.

You’d think my smarts would have kicked back in when alcohol and exhaustion pulled her under in less than a second, and they did, until Iwoke to her grinding against my thigh and murmuring my name in her sleep.

It was obvious she was having a sex dream, and although she was no longer intoxicated, I slipped out of bed rather than slipping my hand between her legs like I really wanted to.

And I need to walk away again now before it’s too late and I ruin her.

The way she said my name…fuck.

She moaned it not once. Not twice. Over and over again, like the begs she was desperate for me to answer last night had nothing to do with alcohol.

Every time she whimpered, my resolve cracked more.

I grip the vanity sink, knuckles white. “Get in the fucking shower,” I mutter to myself again. “Walk away.”

I don’t move because the truth is stronger than me. I’m not protecting myself. I’m trying to protect her. I’m the bad seed of the family, the rotten roots that eventually kill everything from the inside out. If you side with me, you side with the devil. I can’t put it any simpler than that.

Someone as angelic as Azra doesn’t belong in the ashes of hell.

She has no idea what she’s doing or what she’s asking for.

I amnota man she should tie herself to.

She thinks there’s good beneath the surface of my evil.

She’s wrong.

Evil resides in my veins. It lives in me.

I close my eyes, and her voice echoes again—soft, breathy, and half-asleep.

Matteo…

It thickens my cock as fast as it did last night when she traced the outline of her delicious-smelling cunt with her fingers. Her pussy is the prettiest I’ve seen, but her face in ecstasy trumps everything. Her cheeks darken, her lips slightly part, and her eyes glaze over with more than lust.

She comes alive.

I shouldn’t have the honor of seeing that. I’ve done things—dark things—that stain a man from the inside out. Things that make people cross the street when they see me coming and make mothers pull their children closer.

I’ve spent my whole life carving out a place in the underworld where mercy gets you killed and hesitation gets the people you love killed.

My mother’s untimely death is the clearest proof of this.

Doctors say you can’t die from a broken heart, but they mention nothing about disappointment being the biggest killer.

I pushed against the ropes for years, and although she ended every sentence with three words I’ve never heard from another woman, I know my antics hurt her.

She was bright where I was dark. Soft where I was jagged. Hopeful where I was hollow.

She didn’t belong in my world—just like Azra doesn’t either.

Pushing off the sink, I pace the bathroom. My hand freezes halfway through my hair when I hear Azra’s breathing from the bedroom. It’s light and uneven, wordlessly announcing she’s still dreaming about someone she shouldn’t be.

She’s dreaming about me.

Against the screaming protests of my head, I step into the bedroom doorway and prop my shoulder against the frame. Azra is curled on her side. Her hair spills across the pillow, and her lips part as she murmurs something I can’t make out.